New Ways to Fall Apart
by Skabooom
Summary: After Peter's death and the events of that night, everyone is riled up and turning their attention to those most impacted; leaving Stiles wondering if anyone cares that he made sacrifices too. Sacrifices that left him messed up. Stiles/Danny eventually.
1. Chapter 1

_**Author's Note: So I sort of made some stuff up for this because I'm picking up where season 1 ended...like it, don't like it...it's fun for me. :P**_

* * *

><p>"Focus," Stiles told himself as he sat in the chemistry room, looking down at his exam paper. Once again, Scott wasn't in class and once again he had made an excuse to Mr. Harris, who accepted it skeptically, saying that Scott could make up the exam…not that it would help. Scott was too busy these days to study, and honestly, so was Stiles, but he didn't have the excuse that Scott did. He had turned down the bite, meaning he didn't have the superhuman endurance and strength that Scott did, therefore he had to work twice as hard to keep going with both his normal life and his life as Scott's proverbial assistant. "Focus, just focus, you can do this!" He hadn't had time to study, he was going to fail. If he kept this up, his father would figure out that something was going on and then he would really be in trouble.<p>

"Mr. Stilinski, if you have something to say, you can tell the whole class," Mr. Harris stated.

"It's nothing, sir, I'm sorry." He looked back down at his paper, trying to do his best to answer questions, but all that he could think about was what had happened and what was going to happen next.

Jackson was a werewolf now, so he was getting attention. Lydia wasn't, but she had had a very near brush with death, so she was getting attention. Scott was, as usual, getting everyone's attention, and because she was Allison, she had all of Scott's attention. They had all been through traumatic events, and no one seemed to realize that Stiles had too, that he had _given _himself to the alpha to save Lydia, to protect Scott. He had been sure when he did that that he wouldn't come out alive, and as miraculous as it was that he had, no one seemed to care or wonder if he was alright, they just assumed that he was Stiles, that he would be okay no matter what. He was Scott's rock, but Scott took him for granted and for good reason. No matter what Scott did, Stiles would always be there for him, he just didn't think that he could count on Scott for the same thing, not anymore. Allison came first and it seemed like nothing else mattered.

"Time's up." Mr. Harris looked out over the classroom and Stiles let out a hefty sigh, passing a practically blank exam up the row to the teacher before packing his stuff. He was smart, he knew that, he was a lot smarter than most people his age, at least according to aptitude tests. Unfortunately, this meant that his father and pretty much everyone else had these high expectations for him, expectations that he might be able to achieve if his life were normal, but with his best friend as a werewolf and everything constantly going to hell around him, he was unable to do so.

"Hey." Danny walked up behind him as he left the classroom. "Did you have a brain freeze or something?"

"What do you mean?" Stiles asked, looking up at the other boy.

"I saw your test paper, man. At least on the first page you hardly wrote two sentences on one question. Usually your papers have writing literally all over them."

The first thing that came to mind was why the hell Danny even looked at his test papers. You weren't supposed to look at anyone else's, even after the exams were over, though he supposed that his normally copious amounts of writing were hard to miss. He just shrugged, not granting Danny's question with an answer, which was, again, rather unusual, but he just had other things on his mind.

"Okay then." Danny shrugged, pushing through the crowd and leaving Stiles on his own. That chemistry test was an F, it had to be, and he would have to take it home, have his father sign it. His dad would sit him down and ask what the hell was wrong with him recently, and he was going to have to lie to his father. Again. Then again, he was really lying to everyone, wasn't he? Sure, maybe it was lies of omission, but lies none the less. Everyone just assumed that he was fine, and he just let them think that because, well, they all had their own stuff to deal with.

He pulled out his phone, calling Scott, hoping that maybe his friend would answer and let him know why he hadn't been in class today.

"Scott?" He leaned against his locker, talking to his friend. "Where the hell are you? You missed a chemistry test. Mr. Harris says you can make it up as long as you do it like right away. I told him you had the flu."

"Oh, yeah, I'll get to it, look, now's not a great time."

"How about later?" he asked. "We can go grab burgers and catch up?"

"I can't tonight, I'm going to be with Allison."

"You're always with Allison," Stiles pointed out.

"Yeah, and she needs me. She's really screwed up about what she saw that night, with her aunt and everything, and the alpha on fire, it gives her nightmares."

"Oh." Stiles sighed. Did it not matter at all that he was there too? That he and Jackson had been the ones to make the Molotov cocktails that brought the alpha down? It was all about Allison and Scott and, well, everyone but him. "Okay, then I'll see you around." He shut his phone off and jammed it into his pocket, turning around and slamming his fist into his locker, hurting himself far more than the metal door.

"Usually it's McCall pulling that locker destroying crap," Danny said casually from where he stood, leaning against the lockers next to Stiles.

"Yeah, well today it's me," Stiles snapped.

"Whoa, chill out, it was just an observation, I'm not going to report you or anything."

"Yeah, okay." Stiles shrugged.

"I just wanted to say…something's going on with you. Don't try denying it. You're smart, everyone knows you're smart. You wouldn't leave a test empty unless you were really distracted. You might write down things that didn't have to do with the subject, but you wouldn't leave it empty."

"So?" Stiles bit his lip. Why did it have to be Danny who noticed that he was off base? Why couldn't it be someone who knew the truth, someone he didn't have to lie to? He needed to talk about everything, what he'd seen, what he'd been through, but everyone was too busy, and if he told this stuff to a therapist, they'd have him committed.

"So…if you want to talk about it, I'm around." Danny hitched up his backpack and turned, walking back down the hallway leaving a very confused Stiles staring at the lockers.


	2. Chapter 2

"Hey." Stiles' father knocked on the doorframe leading to his son's room, looking at the boy, who was bent over some paper's at his desk. Stiles didn't respond, lost in the papers he was reading. Scott had asked him to do research about a cure for the bite, and as frustrated as he may be with Scott, he wasn't going to stop trying to help his friend. "Hey, earth to Stiles." The man walked into the room, tapping his son on the shoulder.

"FUCK!" Stiles jumped, instantly shielding the papers from his father's view. "Didn't you learn to knock?"

"Kid, I did knock," he stated, looking at his son with slight concern. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, yeah, totally, of course, I was just focusing, you know, paper for English class and all that."

"If something was up with you, you'd tell me, right?"

"Yeah, of course." Stiles nodded, hating that he had to lie to his father, and, well, pretty much everyone else in his life.

"Cause you've seemed a little distracted lately."

"School's really picking up, I'm just trying to keep on top of my grades." He knew that he would be caught in that lie once his father realized just how much his grades were slipping, but for now it was pretty safe.

"Alright, well keep up the good work." He patted Stiles on the back and left the room, closing the door.

Stiles let out a deep sigh, shaking his head. He was spending so much time helping Scott try to find a cure when he was fairly certain that there wasn't one. The alpha, the one that bit Scott had been the only way, and he was gone now, leaving Scott without any choice. He took a few deep breaths before getting back to work for a couple of hours.

"Hey." Stiles was once again pulled from his thoughts by someone entering his room, but this time it was Scott.

"Hey." Stiles looked up, leaning back in his chair.

"So have you found anything yet?" Scott asked, sitting down on the bed across from Stiles.

"No." Stiles bit his lip, looking at his friend. "Scott, I really don't think that we're going to find anything, there's just not…I'm pretty sure there's not a way, I mean, aside from the wolf that bit you. I'm sorry, but I think you might just have to embrace this."

"How can I embrace it?" Scott looked incredulously at Stiles. "How can I just start enjoying what I am? You think it's easy, Stiles? It's fucking hard! My girlfriend's family wants to hunt me. To HUNT me. I just want to be normal again, you don't understand!"

"Calm down!" Stiles stood up, facing Scott. "If you don't, you'll wolf out, you know that you can't risk that, okay?" Honestly, he didn't understand why Scott was yelling at him. He hadn't done anything wrong, it wasn't his fault that there was no cure, but there was no explaining that to Scott, especially not when he was angry.

"I can't calm down! I'm a wolf and my girlfriend's family hunts wolves!" He reached out, punching a hole in the wall.

"Scott!" Stiles grabbed the boy by his shoulders. "If you calm down and learn how to control this, it will be okay."

"I have to go see Allison," Scott growled, pulling away from Stiles and storming out of the house loudly. Stiles flopped down on his bed, shaking his head. He always had to go see Allison, even when she wasn't the person trying to help him.

"Hey, you sure everything's okay?" Sheriff Stilinski appeared in the door yet again, looking at his son. "Scott just stormed out of here seeming incredibly angry…he's been doing that a lot lately."

"Yeah, he's going through some stuff, its fine, really." Stiles shrugged, doing his best to make his father believe what he was saying. Of course it wasn't okay, his best friend had just yelled at him for something that wasn't his fault.

"Alright, well I have to be at work late tonight, so there's frozen pizza in the freezer and a $20 on the counter if you'd rather buy a real one."

"Thanks." Stiles waved as his father walked out. He flopped down on his bed, staring at the ceiling, wondering how he was supposed to fix this all. He felt all alone, completely alone for the first time in his life, and he had no idea what to do. His mother was gone, his best (and really only) friend was gone, spending all of his time with someone else and his father worked ridiculous hours all the time. He was pulled from his thoughts as his phone made a noise next to him.

Stiles looked over, surprised to see that he had a text message from Danny. He scrolled down to read the message.

**Hey. Just checking up on you. Things seemed bad at school, offer to talk still stands. –Danny**

Stiles looked at the message for a moment, wondering if he was actually alone as he felt. No, he couldn't tell Danny anything, not the truth, but how hard would it be to come up with a lie for why he was off his game…after all, his mother was dead and his father worked constantly, that alone should be enough, right?

**Dad's working late, I was just about to order a pizza…you wanna come share? –Stiles**

Stiles had almost never had other friends, it had been Scott since they were kids and they had both been so low on the pecking order that they really only had each other, and now that Scott had other people, maybe it was time for Stiles to as well. Of course, he was still concerned that Danny didn't actually want to be friends, that he had just been checking up on Stiles because it was the right thing to do, but nonetheless, it might be nice to take a chance.

**Pizza sounds great. See you in 10. – Danny**

As his phone beeped, Stiles smiled, deciding to hold off on ordering the pizza until Danny got there. After all, he didn't know the other boy well enough to know what he liked and he didn't want to assume that everyone was interested in his own weird pizza preferences. He didn't think that they would be spending any time in his room, but Stiles wasn't going to take any chances. He got up and went to his desk, sweeping all of his werewolf research into a pile, shoving it into the top drawer of his desk and away from the view of any friends or his increasingly more nosey father. Once he was sure there was nothing incriminating in view, he went downstairs to watch TV while he waited for Danny.


	3. Chapter 3

"Hey…" Stiles awkwardly opened the door when Danny rang the doorbell almost exactly ten minutes later. "What's up?"

"You mentioned free pizza, so…" Danny walked in, leaning up against the door his hands shoved in his pockets.

"Right, yeah, I was wondering what you wanted on your half." Stiles grabbed the telephone to place the order.

"Whatever you're having I fine."

"I'm pretty sure you might want to rethink that offer."

"Why?" Danny quirked an eyebrow, looking skeptically at the other boy. "What do you put on your pizza?"

"Um, pepperoni, pineapple and anchovies." Stiles looked down, the very tip of his ears turning red. Scott and his father constantly made fun of his pizza choice, claiming that it was just yet another thing that set Stiles apart from the rest of the world. As much as he tried to fit in, there were always going to be things about him that didn't.

"Well that's definitely interesting," Danny stated, wrinkling his nose slightly. "I think I'll go with just the pepperoni on my half."

"Probably a good call." In all of the years of his odd pizza choice, Scott had been the only other person ever to try it, and the boy had almost thrown up he had found the combination so disgusting. Stiles didn't want that to happen to anyone else. "You can go chill on the couch, we have cable, I'll place the order and be right in." He tapped at his phone with his hand and headed up to his bedroom, leaving Danny unsure of why he had to make a call for a pizza in private…but that was probably just something else about Stiles that he would never understand, after all, the kid put pineapple AND anchovies on his pizza, he had lost out on any chance to be normal a long time ago.

Danny sat down on the couch, flipping channels aimlessly while waiting for the other boy to return. He wasn't here to watch TV, he was here to eat pizza and talk to Stiles. He wasn't stupid. He knew that something was going on with the boy, with Scott, with Jackson, Lydia and Allison, he just didn't know what. First off, Jackson had been spending WAY too much time with that gang when Danny knew for a fact that he had hated Scott and Stiles…or at least he had. Second, they had all been missing school, and they all seemed to be in the wrong place at the wrong time when bad things went down. It was all too much of a coincidence for Danny…and with the cell phone trace that Stiles had practically forced him into running, well, something was clearly afoot, he just didn't know what it was.

"Hey, so it's going to be about 30 minutes." The guy on the phone had said 40, but Stiles knew the pizza company very well since his mom had died, and when they said 40, they meant 30, they just wanted the wiggle room in case something happened.

"Cool." Danny nodded, turning off the TV and looking at Stiles. "So, what's up?"

"What's up?" He bit his lip. It was time to lie, and he knew it.

"Yeah, with you. You've been acting weird for awhile now, but ever since Lydia ended up in the hospital you've seemed off."

"Oh, yeah…you know, it's just…with my mom dying not too long ago, I didn't want to lose anyone else that I cared about, you know?" It was not really a secret amongst the school that he had had a thing for Lydia, so he figured this answer seemed more than plausible.

"I'm sorry," Danny said softly. The whole school had heard almost two years earlier when Stiles' mother had died. The principal had made an announcement, telling everyone to take it easy on Stiles, who most people had found it pretty easy to pick on prior to that. When Stiles had come back to school after the loss, he had been different, but it seemed in the past year that he had rallied and gotten back to being his old self. "At least Lydia's alright," he said cheerily.

"Yeah, I was really grateful for that, I think a lot of people were, it was just kind of really jarring." He let out a short, dry laugh, looking down at the floor and away from Danny.

"You know, I don't think anyone even thought about how rough that must have been for you, I mean, I know Scott brought her in but I heard through the grapevine that she thought it was you that saved her life…but then she went off talking about how some fucking' monster kidnapped you, so…"

"Yeah, I think she was hallucinating, that was all Scott." Stiles gulped. He hadn't known that Lydia had said those things, and he was glad, for the sake of Scott's secret, that no one had believed her. "I think I'd know if I'd been kidnapped by a monster."

"One would hope." Danny laughed and Stiles was relieved that Danny didn't seem to have any sort of suspicion. Yes, it was a weird thing to believe, that there were monsters running around, but in this town, it was pretty clear that you could never really tell who to trust, who might believe what very few would.

The conversation fell silent, and Stiles fumbled to find the TV remote control to make everything just a little less awkward. He and Danny had never really been friends before, and while Danny sort of seemed like that guy that everyone liked, he knew that he had a penchant for alienating people and Danny would just be another in a long line of potential friends that he had scared away.

"So…" Danny turned to Stiles during a commercial break. "If everything with your mom and Lydia isn't alright, why do pretend like everything's fine all the time?"

"Because other people have bigger problems. I mean, my mom's death is way in the past, and Lydia, she's alright, she's not even my girlfriend. She loves Jackson." Stiles shrugged it off. Deep down, he had always known that Lydia and Jackson were made for each other and that he didn't stand a chance with her. At the dance, when she had left him to go find Jackson, she had only confirmed what he already believed. This was one girl that he was never going to get.

"Yeah, they have their moments, but I think that they're more solid as a couple than most people know. I've talked to Jackson about it, he really cares about her…I'm sorry man."

"It's alright." Stiles shrugged. "I just have to know when to cut my losses, stop chasing the girl that I'm never going to get, and that time, my goal keeping friend, has come."

"Good to know at least someone is being realistic about relationships, unlike your lovesick friend."

"Scott?" Stiles snorted with laughter. "Yeah, he's so gone for Allison."

"Its borderline really gross," Danny admitted, making a face that got Stiles laughing. The two continued to talk about Scott and Allison, making fun of their sappy dynamic and eating pizza. Stiles was surprised to find himself actually having a good time, and for awhile, even forgetting about all of the shit that was going down in his life and the lives of his friends. Even if he was lying to Danny, it was still nice to know that someone cared about him enough to come over and give comforting him a shot.


	4. Chapter 4

Danny left that night with Stiles in a much better mood than he had been in a long time. Sure, they had talked about his mom a little bit, watched some TV, eaten some pizza, but he felt as though they had also gotten to know each other, as though he made a friend in the goalie that had previously not liked him very much. Stiles cleaned up the pizza box and headed upstairs to his room, taking another look at the pages of information about curing werewolves before sighing and tucking them away again. There were tons of theories, but none of them fit into the lore that seemed to be real life. Every single one of them seemed like bullshit to him, and as far as he could tell, Scott agreed.

"What are you still doing up?" Sheriff Stilinski walked into Stiles' room, surprised to find his son in bed with the light on, reading a book.

"Couldn't sleep." Stiles shrugged. "Good book, you know how that goes."

"You'd best try and find a way to get some rest, it's a school night," he pointed out.

"Will do."

"Oh, and I noticed that there's no left over pizza?" He leaned against the door frame, looking at his son, one eyebrow raised. "You eat the whole thing?"

"No, I had a friend over."

"Really? Didn't look like Scott was in much of a pizza sharing mood when he stormed out of here earlier."

"He wasn't, it wasn't Scott."

"Stiles…we've talked about this, you're not supposed to have girls here when I'm not around!"

"It wasn't a girl, dad." Stiles rolled his eyes, dog-earing the page he was on and setting his book on the nightstand. "I do have other friends, you know."

"You do? Since when?"

"I don't know, since always, they just didn't used to come over."

"Well tell me about this new friend of yours, then."

"Dad, it's 3 AM."

"You seem pretty awake, I'm pretty awake…I want to be a part of your life, Stiles." He walked in, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "I know it's been hard without your mother and with me working all of the time, but you're still my son and I want you to know that I know that."

"Of course I know that, dad." He smiled at his father, glad that he was taking an interest. He sat up, deciding that he might as well spend some time talking to his father, after all, this was a fairly rare occasion.

"So, tell me about this new friend."

"His name's Danny, we're on the Lacrosse team together except, well, he actually plays. He's the goalie." Stiles continued to tell his father about Danny for about 15 minutes before switching around to other things – school, the book Stiles was reading (High Fidelity, by Nick Hornby), girls (namely Lydia and how he was finally giving up on his crush since the 3rd grade) and eventually, they both fell asleep, Stiles in the bed, his father on the floor, too exhausted to even go across the hall to his own room.

When Stiles' alarm went off at 6:30 the next morning, despite less than three hours of sleep, he felt refreshed. He and his father hadn't had a heart to heart like that in a really long time, maybe ever, and as he shook his father awake, he couldn't help but feel like today was going to be a better day, even if he wasn't on the right foot with Scott.

"You seem happier," Danny pointed out, sitting next to Stiles in chemistry instead of taking his usual spot in front of him.

"Had a good night last night." Stiles shrugged.

"Wow, I didn't know that gross pizza and some TV with me could be so good for the soul," Danny teased.

"Who said it was all you?" Stiles threw back.

"Oh? Did you have someone else in your house after me? Busy boy!"

"No, no." Stiles laughed, shaking his head. "My dad came home from work late last night and, I don't know, we actually talked."

"Really?" Danny smiled. He didn't know much about the relationship between Stiles and his father, but he knew that, with the loss of a mother and a wife, as well as all of the responsibility of being the Sheriff, it had to be a strained one.

"Yeah, I was up late reading and he came in and kind of decided that it was time to have a conversation and we started talking and just…didn't really stop until we both fell asleep."

"That's really great." Danny smiled, opening his notebook and turning his attention to the front of the room as class started. Stiles tried to do the same, though once again, his focus was elsewhere.

Scott wasn't in class…again, meaning that he was out doing something or trying to find a cure, and Stiles didn't like what that might mean. He had done so much research to try and help his friend, and it was useless, at least it had been so far.

After school, Stiles decided to drop by Scott's house and see what was up. He started climbing onto the roof, heading for his best friend's bedroom window when he heard a car pull up.

"Use the front door, Stiles." Melissa McCall stepped out of her car, hands on her hips as she saw the teenager trying to sneak into her son's bedroom window.

"Sorry, Ms. McCall," he stated, vaulting down from the roof and onto the ground next to the woman. "Just wanted to see if Scott was home."

"Do you know how to knock?" she asked, rolling her eyes as she unlocked the door. "I don't know if Scott's here, but you're welcome to go up and see for yourself."

"Thanks Ms. M." Stiles saluted her playfully and ran up the stairs to see if his best friend was in. To his surprise, Scott was still in bed, covers pulled up around him. "Hey…" Stiles walked over, poking his friend. "You okay?"

"What?" Scott woke up, looking up at Stiles. "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine."

"You don't look fine," Stiles pointed out. "And you have to stop missing class or you're going to have to repeat the year. I brought you notes and your assignments, though." He opened his backpack, prepared to take the materials out, but Scott reached out, stopping him.

"There's no point," he stated, shaking his head. "Derek came by last night. He wants me to join his pack."

"So?" Stiles shrugged. "Just tell him no."

"He's not the same, Stiles, he's different, he's…he's not our friend anymore. He said that I had a week to think about it before he'd ask me again, but I think…I think he's going to do something to Allison if I say no."

"So protect her," Stiles said, sinking into Scott's desk chair. "You and I both know that with her skills and yours combined, you can help keep her safe." He offered his friend an encouraging smile. "But no matter what, moping around in bed all day isn't going to help things."

"I guess you're right…" Scott sighed, pulling himself up into a sitting position. "I should go over and talk to her, maybe let her know what's going on. I guess now that I'm not hiding all of this from her, she deserves to know."

"Atta boy." Stiles smiled, trying not to care that, even though he was the one with the ideas and suggestions, it was Allison that Scott wanted to talk to. "I'll let you get all pretty for your lady, but don't forget to do your homework, okay?" He pulled out the papers and left them on Scott's desk. "I don't want to go to college without my best friend in tow."

"Thanks." Scott nodded appreciatively towards Stiles and headed for the bathroom.

Stiles hopped in his jeep and drove back to school for Lacrosse practice…just in case that, with Scott out, he had a chance at first line and maybe seeing some playing time.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN: I know, this chapter was Danny light, but I think it's important to touch on the other relationships in Stiles' life. Don't worry, next chapter will see more of Danny and Stiles interacting, I promise!**_


	5. Chapter 5

"Hey." Danny came up to Stiles in the locker room after practice. "Wanna go grab a bite? I'm starving and Jackson's busy trying to fix things with Lydia."

"Oh, yeah, sure." Stiles nodded. He knew more than Danny did about just how much needed to be fixed between Jackson and Lydia, but he was glad that they were getting along, he was surprised, even, that Lydia had been able to accept Jackson back, werewolf and all, as long as he promised to stop being a giant jackass.

"Cool. Do you wanna take your car or mine or both?"

"We can take yours." Stiles shrugged. "Then you can just drop me here after and I can get myself home."

"Alright them." Danny started walking, and Stiles grabbed his backpack, following after him. "So I told coach that I think you should take Scott's place on first line," he said, beginning to drive slowly.

"You did? Why?"

"Because you care. You're passionate, and a lot of people on the team, well, they're just there because they think it'll make them look good, help them get girls or whatever, but you seem like you actually like it, like you really want to play, even-"

"Even though I suck?" Stiles laughed.

"Even though you suck." Danny nodded, smiling sidelong at Stiles. "Sometimes skill isn't all that matter; having enough passion isn't always enough, but with a team as strong as ours, it wouldn't hurt to have someone on the field who really cares."

"It's nice to know that you think that, but I'm pretty sure no one else does." Stiles laughed, glad that Danny was so supportive of him. No one really believed in him besides his dad, and it was nice to have someone in his corner that didn't have to be there.

"Well we'll see." Danny shrugged, pulling into the parking lot of a 50s dinner called The Sock Hop.

The two boys walked in and chose a booth in the back and ordering almost immediately, a double cheese burger and fries for Danny, a double-decker grilled cheese sandwich with pickles for Stiles.

"Wow." Danny laughed as the waiter walked away. "You eat really, really interesting foods, don't you." He let out a low whistle, shaking his head at the idea of a sandwich consisting of cheese melted over pickle slices.

"I have…very unique taste buds." He had been embarrassed of his food choice at first, but after awhile the fact that he found them delicious became enough and he had gotten over that fact.

"Something tells me there are a lot of things about you that are unique," Danny pointed out, looking down at the table and not making eye contact with the other boy.

"Yeah, starting with me name," he muttered.

"What IS your name, anyways?" Danny asked, tilting his head to the side.

"No, I'm not telling you that." Stiles shook his head. "No one knows that but my family, even Scott doesn't know. It's a family name and it's not really mine, Stiles is my name for all intense and purposes."

"Okay then." Danny decided to let it go, even though Stiles answer just made him even more curious about what the boy's name was. "But you're still unique, I don't think most people have ever met someone like you, someone with a loyalty to your best friend that pretty much transcends anything."

"How do you know I'm that loyal to Scott?" Stiles asked, tilting his head to the side.

"Because you're always covering for him and doing things for him, and he seems like he's kind of an emotional wreck a lot of the time and you're the one talking him up and supporting him, even though it doesn't really seem like he does the same things for you."

"I…really had no idea that you saw all of that," Stiles muttered, looking down at the table, glad for something to focus on once his sandwich arrived. Danny had sort of come out of left field as an unexpected friend, and while Stiles felt comfortable telling Scott almost everything, he wasn't there with Danny yet and he didn't want to mess the friendship up by getting too attached too quickly.

"I see a lot more than people know." Danny smiled across the table at Stiles, biting into his burger.

In all fairness, Stiles wasn't the only one a little surprised at the budding friendship. Danny, himself, was surprised that he got along with Stiles. The other boy had struck him as a spastic of epic proportions, and after some of the questions he had asked in the past semester, he had suspected Stiles was either sexually confused or, the more likely option, mildly homophobic and mocking him, but now he realized that Stiles was probably just curious and didn't really know how to filter himself…though Danny was glad that Stiles was not going to ask the same question he had asked him again, because if he did, he was afraid that he might tell the boy the truth and ruin the budding friendship – after all, finding someone attractive and wanting to date them were two different things, but a lot of less than gay guys had trouble separating the two.

The two boys fell into silence, eating their food quickly, Stiles practically wolfing down the sandwich that he knew only he found to be delicious. Danny was special, he could tell that, and he wondered if Danny had spent his life playing second fiddle to Jackson the way that he had been with Scott and now that Jackson was a werewolf, despite the fact that Danny didn't know it, they had both been demoted to somewhat sidekick like positions.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Danny asked, tilting his head to the side, nibbling on a French fry once his burger was done.

"Oh, just uh…just thinking about Scott, he put an interesting dilemma on the table earlier and I'm trying to think of a way around it for him."

"Can I help?"

"It's personal, so I can't really tell you, but thanks."

"This is what I mean." Danny smiled. "You're a really caring friend, keeping his secrets and trying to solve his problems when it's more than clear that you have stuff of your own to deal with, stuff that Scott doesn't really seem to even notice, I'm guessing?"

"Yeah, well his problems are a lot bigger than mine are right now."

"Really?" Danny looked skeptically across the table at Stiles. "How could he have bigger problems then a dead mother and a father who doesn't spend that much time around him?"

"Oh, you'd be surprise." Stiles laughed, knowing that he had to derail the question before it got out of hand. "So, um…I should be getting home, I think dad's actually going to be around for dinner tonight."

"Oh…but you just ate."

"I mean neither of us are stellar cooks, so we just give it our best and hope that something turns out. Sometimes it takes a really long time for us just to get dinner on the table."

"Okay, well, I'll see you around." Danny smiled, joining Stiles in throwing a few dollars on the table.

"Um, but…you have to take me back to school first," Stiles reminded him. "Because, um, that's where my car is."

"Oh, right." Danny nodded and it wasn't long before they were back in the school parking lot. "Well um, I'll see you later, okay? Call me if you need anything."

"I will, thanks." Stiles got into his jeep, just sitting there for a minute before driving home, letting it sink in that he finally had another friend…and it was nice. However, he forced himself to pull his mind from how good he felt about himself around Danny and onto Scott's problem. They had a week to figure out how to diffuse the Derek bomb before someone got hurt, and Scott was probably right. It was likely to be Allison.

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN alright, so there was some Stiles/Danny bonding, a little more...odd food choice on Stiles' part, and maybe even a few sparks. There will be a little drama in the next chapter, I promise. :)_**


	6. Chapter 6

As the week went by, Stiles could see Scott getting increasingly more anxious. It was clear that he didn't want to join Derek's pack, that he didn't want to be a part of any pack, but at the same time, he was terrified about what would happen to Allison if he refused.

"Allison's not a weak damsel in distress, Scott," Stiles stated the day before the week was up. They were both sitting in Stiles' room, Scott on the bed, Stiles at the desk. "It's not like she can't look after herself."

"You don't get it!" Scott stated for the millionth time, throwing his hands up in the air with as much exasperation as he could manage. "It's just any wolf that's after her, it's an Alpha!"

"Yes, and with combined forces, you and her family could protect her against an Alpha," Stiles reminded. "You have to take into consideration the fact that her family has been doing this sort of thing for decades – hell, probably centuries. They know how to defend themselves against a wolf and with you there to help protect her, if Derek does attack, it'll be okay. You'll be able to defend her and each other."

"I don't know…" he sighed, flopping down on the bed and looking up at the ceiling. "Maybe you're right, maybe if I just go over there, warn her, warn her parents and stay by her side everything will be fine."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you!" It was Stiles' turn to be exasperated. In the past few days he had gotten barely any homework done and had spent the majority of his time trying to find ways to get Scott out of this mess with Derek. He had done countless hours of research and all that he had managed to come up with was the plan that he had detailed time and again for his friend. Yes, Danny had come over almost every night while his father was working, but only for a couple of hours and really just for dinner and TV.

Stiles had grown to welcome Danny's arrival and was glad for it, as it served as his only break from the work he was doing for Scott. He wished that he could spend more time with the goalie and less time easing his best friend's nerves. It would have been different, of course, if Scott ever listened to him, but the fact that Scott just whined and shouted at him made Stiles wonder if doing all of this work for him was worthwhile. He wasn't appreciated and until he gave Scott the answers that he wanted, he was pretty sure that he wouldn't be.

"So you really think that's the best way to go?" Scott asked, sitting up and looking bleary-eyed at Stiles.

"I mean, I guess so…there's always a chance that he's bluffing." Stiles looked over at Scott. "I mean you're knocking heads now, but he's helped you and you've definitely helped him in the past."

"That was when we were both Betas, though," Scott pointed out. "Something about him is different now that he's the Alpha, it's like the power is getting to him."

"That's probably exactly what's happening," Stiles stated. "Being the top dog does give you a sense of entitlement and if he feels as though he is entitled to a pack with you in it, then there is a good chance that he will try anything to get you involved, including hurt Allison…though he isn't stupid." Stiles bit his lip, looking at his computer for a second before turning back to Scott. "There's always the possibility that he's too smart to run into a house of wolf hunters for the sole purpose of getting you to join his pack. I'm just not sure how important it is for him, if it's worth risking his life for.

"Well I guess we'll find out tomorrow, won't we?" Scott sighed, wishing that Stiles had yielded something more useful, some way to get Derek off of his back for good, or even better, a way to find himself turned to human, a way for him to break the curse that caused him to shift every time his heart rate rose too much.

"Just do what I suggested and it'll be fine." Stiles looked at his friend, staring him down, hoping that his calm would pass onto Scott. "Go to Allison's house, alert her family and make sure that everyone is ready for what might go down tomorrow."

"Okay." Scott took a deep breath, trying to keep himself composed. He knew that this wasn't Stiles' fault, that his best friend was doing everything he could, but he still couldn't fight the feeling that there had to be another option, that this shouldn't have to come to blows between two once-friendly wolves.

"I know it's not ideal, but there's nothing else, Scott…" Stiles looked apologetically at his friend. "I'm sorry."

"I know." Scott nodded, hoisting his legs over the side of the bed and getting to his feet. "I think I should stay the night with Allison, you know, make sure that I'm there in case he decides that midnight is when he wants his decision."

"He already knows your decision," Stiles stated. "If you were going to join the pack, you would have made contact before now. I would be anticipating any movement almost right away."

"Okay." Scott looked at the clock on the bedside table. He had one hour to get to Allison's, explain everything to the family and prepare for the worst.

"Keep me updated," Stiles insisted, walking Scott down to the front door, almost as apprehensive as the teen wolf was. He was afraid that his friend would get hurt, that they were wrong and that Derek would destroy everyone in the house.

"I will. Thanks." Scott took off, leaving Stiles leaning against the door frame, knowing that neither of them would be getting any sleep that night.

Stiles found himself wishing that he wasn't alone right now, but his father was at work, Scott had to be at Allison's, and it was way too late to call Danny; they weren't close enough for that kind of thing yet, and besides, a late night call would mean explaining to Danny why he was upset and he wasn't sure he wanted to lie to the goalie anymore. He went to the kitchen, warmed up some pizza and picked at it for almost an hour, checking his phone every 30 seconds for news from Scott.

It was midnight, and then it was 1 AM, then 1:30 and Stiles began to think that he wasn't going to get any word that night. He decided to go up to his room to try and get some sleep, but as soon as he entered his room, he realized that something was off. There was someone standing in the center of the room, and it wasn't Scott.

"Hello, Stiles." Derek Hale smirked at the teenager. "Didn't expect me to show up here, did you."

"What are you doing, Derek?" Stiles asked, his heart beginning to race.

"I'm showing Scott that he can't just deny me what I want," Derek stated. "He's looking after Allison, but he'll hurt just as much if something happens to you."

The second he heard those words, Stiles took off, trying to run away, but he was no match for the wolf. Derek caught up with him at the foot of the stairs and grabbed him by the neck. He slammed the boy's head into the wall, knocking him unconscious and laughed as he hoisted Stiles above his shoulder. Derek left the house, smirk on place on his lips, wondering how long it would take Scott to realize he had been protecting the wrong person.

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN And...cliffhanger. Thoughts on what should happen next?  
>Also, which character would you guys like to see more of in this story? <em>**


	7. Chapter 7

Around 4 AM, Scott awoke to the sound of his phone ringing. He had been asleep on Allison's floor but the sound jarred him instantly awake. "Hello?"

"Scott? This is Mr. Stilinski."

"Hi." Scott double checked the time, then began to wonder why the Sheriff would be calling him so late.

"Is Stiles with you?" he asked.

"No…"

"Do you know where he is? And don't cover for him. Its 4 AM, I just got home from work and his car is here, but he's not and he's not answering his phone. I just want to know that he's safe."

"I'm sorry, he didn't say anything to me about staying out late," Scott stated, starting to feel his stomach turn nervously, hoping that he was starting to wonder about was not, in fact, the case. He had left Stiles unattended, assuming that Derek would go right for Allison the way that the Alpha had tried to, but he had failed to think that Derek, who knew how close Scott and Stiles were, might go for the friend instead.

"Do you have a phone number for that other friend of his? Danny, I think he said his name was."

"Stiles and Danny are friends?" The last Scott had heard, Danny and Stiles pretty much knocked heads, but if Danny might know where Scott was, well, he was going to pass on the number. "Hold on, I have the number, I'm texting it to you now." He sent the number to Mr. Stilinski and hung up, shaking Allison awake.

"Scott?" Allison stretched, looking up at him. "What is it, is he here?"

"No, he's not." Scott bit his lip. "I think…I think I made a mistake."

"What kind of mistake?" She sat straight up, suddenly wide awake.

"I assumed that Derek would go after you if I didn't give him what he wanted, I didn't think that he might go for Stiles, but his dad just called and he's not at home and the jeep is there but Stiles is gone."

"Do you think Derek did something to him?" Allison gulped.

"That's pretty much the only conclusion I can think of to draw, so here's the deal. I want you to go to your parents and tell them what happened and the three of you stay here, prepared for Derek in case this is a decoy. I'm going to go to the house and see if I can track them."

"Alright." Allison did as she was told and Scott took off out of the window, heading to the Sheriff's house to see if he could figure out what had happened to his best friend.

"Alright…" the sheriff sighed into the phone as Danny mentioned that he hadn't seen Stiles since school had let out. "Well let me know if you hear from him." He hung up the phone and turned to Scott. "Danny doesn't know anything. I'm going to go into the station, will you stay here in case he comes back?"

"Yes, of course." Scott nodded, though he had no intention of staying put, not if he could pick up on the scent of either Stiles or Derek. However, he also knew that there was a good chance that Derek had covered their tracks. He would know that Scott would be looking for them, and more than anything, he wanted to know if his friend was alright…whether he was alive or dead.

The Sheriff left, and Scott looked around the house, but try as he might all scent of either male stopped directly outside and was virtually untraceable. He sighed, sitting on the front porch, his head buried in his hands as he waited for the Sheriff to return. He knew that it was Derek who had caused the problem, because it was his scent in the house, he just hoped that the boy was alright.

Sheriff Stilinski had only been gone for about an hour when Scott's phone rang, showing a number on his screen that he didn't recognize.

"Hello? Mr. Stilinski?" he answered almost instantly.

"No, it's Danny Rodriguez from school, the lacrosse goalie?"

"I know who you are," Scott snapped, not because he disliked Danny, but because he was on edge about his missing friend.

"Relax, I'm not calling to be a dick to you, I'm not like that." He sighed. "I was just wondering if anyone's heard from Stiles. His dad called me to ask if I knew where he was and I haven't heard anything since, and I figured you'd be one of the first to know if there was news-"

"No news." Scott interrupted the other boy, partially wishing that he would just hang up. It was good that he was worried about Stiles, but did he have to be bothering Scott over it?

"You don't think he would run away, do you?" Danny asked, worry clearly lacing his normally even voice.

"No, I don't," Scott answered honestly, absolutely positive that Derek had done something to him. "I really don't. He would have taken his car if he was planning on running, at least until he got far enough away."

"So you think someone hurt him?" Danny obviously liked this option less, and he wished that Scott would have at least left room for him to hope that Stiles was just making a power play to get the attention of the two people who neglected him the most, yet he cared about so dearly: his father and Scott.

"I don't know, Danny, I just don't know." Scott let out a deep sigh, wondering what the hell he could do to help his friend. He had cried wolf on Derek Hale before, and not just once. If he were to do it again, there was little to no guarantee that anyone would follow up on it, even the Sheriff.

"Are you sure you don't know?" Danny asked, knowing that, while it may not be wise to push Scott's buttons and scare him back into his hole, it might be the best way to find out if something was up.

"Why would you think that I did?" Scott asked.

"Stiles has seemed…I don't know, upset, stressed out lately and you've barely been showing up to school. When I asked him about it, he dodged the questions pretty well, talking about his mom and how his dad was rarely home, but then the other day he said that he was trying to help you solve a problem and now he's missing."

"Do you think that I had something to do with his disappearance?" Scott asked defensively.

"No, no, I just think that you should rack your brain and see if maybe there's something in there you overlooked, something he said or something you two both talked about that might hold the answers, or at least a clue."

"You're really worried about him, aren't you." The way that Scott spoke made it clear that it wasn't a question. Danny was obviously concerned about their missing mutual friend, and while Scott was surprised that they had gotten close, he wasn't going to turn down the kindness that Danny was showing. After all, there might be some way for him to help.

"You're changing the subject," Danny stated matter of factly, not thinking he needed to confirm Scott's point. Yes, of course he was worried about Stiles, they were friends and he wanted to do whatever he could to help.

"Maybe, not necessarily." Scott bit his lip. Stiles had mentioned that Danny had a police record for computer skills, and Stiles had used him for his help before. Maybe, just maybe, Danny was the person that he needed to help locate his best friend.

"What do you mean?" Danny asked.

"I mean…maybe there is something that you can do, something that we can do, to help find him." He bit his lip, deciding to throw a hail Mary and see if Danny was interested. "I'm over at Stiles' house. Come meet me here."

"I'll be there in 15."

Danny hung up the phone, leaving Scott wondering how many lies Danny would believe before he got suspicious.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN Sorry that this chapter was kind of filler, but I promise some more action (and more of Derek) in the next chapter!**_

_**Also, I've decided to ask a question at the end of each chapter, so...what do YOU think/want to happen to Stiles (other than get bitten because that's not going to happen)?**_


	8. Chapter 8

When Stiles awoke, he was in a room he didn't recognize, sat in a chair with his wrists tied behind his back. Derek sat in a chair across from him, a smirk spreading across the werewolf's face as he realized Stiles was regaining consciousness.

"It's about time, sleeping beauty," he said teasingly, scooting his chair a little closer to the boy. "How you feelin'?"

"Like I got hit in the head with a sack of bricks," Stiles muttered, wanting to rub his head, but finding it an impossibility given the situation.

"Not too far off, really." Derek shrugged, leaning back in his chair, though both eyes remained on Stiles.

"Are you going to kill me?" Stiles asked.

"Wow, you really don't beat around the bush at all, do you?"

"Not really, no." Stiles sighed. He was trying to put on his bravest attitude, despite the fact that his head was killing him and he was sitting across from a potentially psychopathic werewolf.

"Well then the answer to your question is no, at least not if I don't have to."

"Meaning…"

"If your friend complies, you'll be returned home safe and sound, as though none of this ever happened."'

"So if Scott agrees to join your pack, you'll let me go?" Stiles asked.

"Exactly." Derek smirked. "Now why don't we call that friend of yours and see if he'll meet the demands. He didn't play along so nicely when I asked him, but let's see if he'll do it for his best friend."

"He won't," Stiles snapped, gripping at the ropes, trying to loosen the knots and maybe form an escape. Derek had always terrified him, and this was no different, but he had to be brave for Scott. This wasn't the first time that he had been at jeopardy in the hands of an alpha, and if he got out of this situation, he was certain that it wouldn't be the last.

"I didn't want to hurt you, Stiles," Derek stated. "I always did like you, you were a loyal member of Scott's pack, wolf or not, but I'm afraid that it's that loyalty that makes you such a good lynchpin now. Scott loves you as a brother, as a friend, whatever, he loves you nonetheless, and he'll do pretty much anything to protect the girl he has a school boy crush on, so what lengths wouldn't he go to for the protection of his long-time best friend?"

"He won't do it because I would NEVER ask him to do that!" Stiles snapped, his bravery met with nothing more than a rough slap to the face. He winced in pain as Derek's claws scraped his cheek, but he refused to lose face.

"You know, you're really ballsy when push comes to shove," Derek stated, leaning forwards and gripping Stiles' shoulders. "But I can and will hurt you. You're not the only leverage that I have against Scott, and maybe it will take killing you to realize that I'm serious." Derek shrugged.

"I thought you didn't want to hurt me," Stiles said.

"I said I didn't want to, not that I wouldn't. Now I'm going to call Scott and you're going to tell him to commit to my pack."

"And if I don't?" Stiles asked, his heart pounding in fear.

"I know you're afraid of me," he stated. "I can hear your little heart about to burst from terror, so you're going to do as I say or I'll make those fears come true."

"I may be afraid of you, but that doesn't mean that I'm willing to sell out my friends."

"Well we'll see about that." Derek grabbed Stiles and dragged him through what appeared to be a hotel room over to a bed. He threw him on the side of the bed and picked up the phone, dialing Scott's cell. He put one hand on Stiles' throat and with the other, held the phone to Stiles' ear.

"Hello?" Scott answered on the first ring.

"Scott, it's me." Stiles gulped, more than wary of the hand on his throat.

"Stiles?" Scott sounded panicked, and Stiles closed his eyes, trying to compose himself. "Are you alright? Was it Derek? How did you get free?"

"I didn't, he's right here," Stiles stated.

"Tell him what I told you to," Derek growled.

"Are you okay?" Scott asked again.

"I'm fine." Stiles nodded, managing to lean forwards just briefly, looking at the phone. "I have something very important to tell you," he stated.

"I'm listening."

"One, one, two, seven." Stiles recited the four digit room code. 11th floor, room 27. He barely got the last number out, however, before Derek grabbed the phone away from him, slamming it down on the receiver.

"What the hell did you do that for?" Derek shouted, wrapping one hand around Stiles' neck, pushing him against the headboard of the bed.

"I told you." Stiles managed to choke the words out from behind Derek's hand. "I won't betray my friend."

"You're a lot braver than I thought, Stilinski," Derek snarled, not loosening his grip on the boy's throat. "But to give up our location like that wasn't brave, it was stupid."

"So what now?" Stiles asked, not even bothering to hide his fear, after all, Derek could detect it in his heart rate.

"We have to move again," he snapped. He tightened his grip around Stiles' neck, almost completely cutting off the boy's air supply. He held on until Stiles was unconscious, then grabbed his backpack, lifted the boy and disappeared with both down the fire escape and into the night.

"What was that?" Danny asked, looking up at Scott the second he hung up.

"That was Stiles," he stated, going as pale as he could with his naturally tan complexion.

"Is he alright?" Danny asked, his eyes widening as he looked at the other boy. It didn't look good, not with the panic he could read on Scott's face, but he wanted to be sure before he went into panic mode.

"No." Scott shook his head. "I…I don't think he is."

"What did he tell you?"

"One, one, two, seven," Scott recited, determined not to forget those four numbers.

"What?" Danny frowned, not at all sure of what that meant.

"One, one-"

"I heard you, I just…I don't know what it means."

"I'm not sure I do either." Scott sighed.

"We need to call the police, call his dad and let him know that contact was made, pass on the numbers, we need to-"

"No, no, we can't do that." Scott shook his head. If they called the cops, this would be game over. The city would be swarming with police looking for Stiles and it would scare the Alpha out of town and Stiles along with him.

"Why not?" Danny asked.

"We just can't, okay?" Scott jumped to his feet, gripping his phone so tight that he could feel the casing start to crack in his hands.

"Look, either tell me what's going on, or I'm going to the police. My friend is in danger, and I know that you care about him, but you really haven't been there for him lately and I have, so if you're not going to help me help you help him, I'm going to assume that that's not what you're trying to do and I'm going to find a way to help him myself." Danny took a deep breath at the end of his speech, staring Scott down.

"It's really complicated, Danny, but I promise you that I'm trying to help him, we just can't involve the cops because…because they won't believe what I have to tell them about this, about who took Stiles."

"Who took him, Scott?" Danny asked, his voice dangerously low.

"Derek Hale." Scott looked down at the floor. "But I've already cried wolf on him twice before and if I do it again, the police won't believe me this time because I was wrong the last two times and they just won't trust me again."

"What if I said it?"

"They would know it sprung from me." He sighed. "They would need some serious evidence to really investigate him again after the last two times and I just don't have anything like that. I'm just going to have to do this on my own."

"Scott, you're just a kid, how can you expect to track down a kidnapper all by yourself?"

"It's really complicated, and…" he bit his lip. "I think there's a good chance that you could help me."

"I could?" Danny tilted his head to the side.

"Yes, Stiles told me about your arrest record and I think that I could really use your technological skills."

"Okay." Danny nodded. "If it'll help Stiles anything, but first you need to tell me what's going on, Scott, and I want to know everything. No lies and no skeleton story."

"Fine." Scott bit his lip. "Let's just…let's go to my place and work this out, I don't want the Sheriff knowing any of this, it will only worry him more and he doesn't need that right now."

"Worry him more?" Danny gulped. "Scott, how much danger is Stiles in?"

"A lot," Scott stated, running out the door to Danny's car. "A lot."

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN Thanks for reading, as always! I hope you enjoyed this, and the next chapter will feature more Stiles and Derek, fear not._**

**_And for the question of the chapter - not related to my story, but what is your biggest hope for Teen Wolf Season 2?_**


	9. Chapter 9

This time when Stiles awoke, he was lying on his side on the cold, stone ground of a room with no windows and barely any light, save for one overhead. His face hurt and throat hurt and his head was pounding, hurting more than it ever had in his life. He looked up to see Derek Hale leaning against the wall, looking down at him.

"So, how's my little traitor?" He asked, crouching down and looking at Stiles, absolutely no hint of friendliness in his voice or expression.

"I didn't betray you," Stiles said, forcing himself to look up at Derek. "Because I was never loyal to you, and I never will be. I'm not a traitor because I will never betray Scott."

"That's what everyone says at first. Then you sit down, talk to them a little bit and they start to realize that what I want really is in their best interests."

"I would lie and say that I'm not afraid of you," Stiles stated "But you would know, so what's the point?" He tried to pull himself up to a sitting position, an awkward feet with his hands still secured behind his back, but he wanted to be at eye level with Derek. Once he managed to get there, his brown eyes stared intensely into Derek's blue ones. "I'm going to say this instead, since you can read me, read this and know that I am not lying. You can do whatever you want to me, you can torture me, you can beat me, abuse, you can threaten to kill me, hell, you can smack within an inch of my life, but I will never do anything to hurt Scott, so you might as well kill me now."

"Those are brave words for someone in your situation," Derek mused, reaching out and grabbing Stiles' chin, leaning closer and baring his fangs.

"Read my heartbeat or whatever it is you werewolves do," Stiles snapped. "I'm not lying, not about that."

"I know you're not lying, at least you don't think you are, but when I start to do what I plan on doing to you, once you start feeling the pain, you'll be begging for mercy and the only way I'll grant it is if you help me get what I want."

"Good luck with that." Stiles pulled away from Derek, managing to get himself free of the man's grip. "You think that loyalty is running in the same pack, having each other's backs as you hunt and kill, but what it really means is loving someone so much that you would do anything, literally anything to protect them, even die, and I'm willing to do that for Scott."

"You know, you're very, very loyal." Derek smirked. "Maybe I should just bite you and have you join my pack, get that loyalty shifted over to me."

"Let's get another thing straight," Stiles stated. "You can bite me, turn me into one of your species, but I will NEVER be a member of your pack. I will never be loyal to you. I know where my loyalties lie, and they aren't shifting anytime soon, so you might as well start twisting my arm and clawing at my face or whatever it is you're going to do, because your words will get you nowhere with me."

Derek growled, letting loose and smacking Stiles in the face once again, this time with a fist guaranteed to leave a black eye. Stiles grunted in pain, trying to hold it in as much as he could. He didn't want to give Derek the satisfaction of knowing how much this all really hurt. Derek had superhuman strength, meaning that, if he wanted to, he could snap Stiles' neck with no trouble at all, and while the other boy knew that, a part of him didn't care. He would die to protect Scott, he would die to protect any of the few people in his life that he really cared about, and if this was the way that he was supposed to go, bleeding in some unknown prison of a room at the hands of a maniacal werewolf, so be it.

"You've got a lot more gumption than people give you credit for, you know that?" Derek asked, watching Stiles breaking heavily on the ground.

"Yeah, I know."

"This is really not what I expected when I decided that you were the one I was going to go after. Frankly, I thought that this was going to be easy, breaking you and getting Scott's loyalty in return."

"Well you guessed wrong," Stiles seethed. He was sick and tired of everyone thinking that he was weak. Just because he didn't have the curse didn't mean that he didn't have a heart twice as strong and more than twice as big. If anyone was going to get through this, it was him.

"Clearly." Derek let out a low whistle.

"You forget, this is not the first time that I've been taken captive by an alpha," he stated.

"Yes, but the last time, I recall, you helped him."

"That was with finding you," he stated. "This is Scott and that's different."

"Wouldn't it be nice if he cared about you as much as you care about him?" Derek snickered. "If he had half the loyalty that you did, he'd be here right now making a promise to join me so that I would let you go and stop hurting you."

Stiles paused as Derek said that. A strong part of him knew that Derek was right, that if Scott was as loyal to Stiles as Stiles was to him that he would be doing exactly that. Stiles would give his life for Scott and it was clear that Scott was not of the same mind, but another part of Stiles understood that. Scott had more to live for, more people to protect and love than Stiles did, and he had never exactly had the loyalty that Stiles did.

"Did I strike a nerve?" He raised an eyebrow, winking at the other boy. "It seems like I did, because you know that no matter how good of a friend you are, Scott doesn't care about you as much as you care about him."

"You know what? You're right." Stiles sighed. "There is always a part of Scott that won't be as loyal to me as I am to him, but you know what else? Reminding me of that isn't going to break me."

"If only." Derek tilted his head to the side as he looked at the boy, one eyebrow quirked. "But what will break you?" he asked.

"Nothing," Stiles shook his head. He was loyal and there was no way that he was going to let Derek get to him. "You can't break me, Hale."

"Oh come on, Stilinski…everyone has a breaking point, don't they?" he tilted his head to the side. "After all, you are only human." He chuckled lightly.

"Oh, that's funny, haha, I see what you did there." Stiles rolled his eyes, well aware of the fact that Derek was poking fun at his less than werewolf status.

"You can make fun of me all you want," Derek stated. "But I'm the one on top, and as feisty as you may pretend to be, there's no way that you'll beat me in the end. Now I'm going to go and place a call to your pup of a friend and see what he has to say when I threaten to torture and kill you."

Derek stood up, but he didn't get very far before Stiles used all of the energy that he had to kick him in the leg, getting the older male's attention and focusing it back on himself.

"You just made a big mistake, Stilinski." Derek turned around, his eyes flashing red with rage as he leapt forwards, slamming his foot down on Stile's shin, shattering his tibia and fibula without any effort at all. Stiles screamed, arching his back, eyes squeezed shut in pain. "I own you, Stiles," Derek seethed, leaping on top of the other boy, pinning him down and looking him straight in the face. "I will bend and break you until there is nothing left, NOTHING, do you understand me?"

"Take…take what you will of me," Stiles stated through clenched teeth. "But you will never get what you want from Scott and you and I both know that."

"If that's true," Derek hissed, getting to his feet. "Then you will die here."

"So be it," Stiles muttered under his breath, curling up as best he could with his broken leg as Derek left the room, slamming and locking the door. He didn't see much hope for himself, but in the grand scheme of things, he was insignificant. Scott had the power to help people, to change the world, or at least help protect it, and if he had to die for Scott to realize that, then so be it.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN A part of why I'm posting so fast right now is because I'm going on spring break soon, and I'm not sure how much posting will get done then, so I'm trying to get you guys to a good stopping point before then so that no one tries to come kill me over mean cliffhangers. :)**_

_**Question for this chapter would be...Who is your favorite Teen Wolf character and why? Bonus: What is your favorite Teen Wolf pairing?**_


	10. Chapter 10

"Wow." Danny looked at Scott, wide eyed as Scott finished telling him everything, well, nearly everything. He left out things that didn't seem important, but he told him about the bite, about the alpha, about Derek, about what he was and what Jackson had become. He had even shown Danny what he looked like wolf form. "Well okay then."

"Well okay then?" Scott frowned. "That's all you have to say when you find out that not only your best friend, but another of your team mates happen to be werewolves?"

"Right now one of my other friends has been kidnapped by a werewolf," Danny said, his tone and demeanor far more clam than he should have been. "I'll have time to freak out later, but right now we need to figure out how we can find Stiles."

"Wow, okay." Scott sat down on his own bed, biting his lip, trying to figure out what they could do. "One, one, two, seven. What consists of four numbers?"

"Most addresses, could be a vanity plate, phone extension…" Danny bit his lip. "Can I see your phone?"

"Yeah, sure, here." Scott held out the phone, and Danny took it. "It won't help you much, he called from a blocked number."

"Blocked to you, maybe." He shrugged, hooking up the phone to Scott's computer and working some magic. "But to me, it's the main number to the Best Western downtown."

"You said that number could be a phone extension?" Scott asked, tilting his head to the side.

"And phone extensions in hotels usually correlate to room numbers. The first letters are probably the floor and the second are the room number. Best Western, floor 11, room 27," Danny said knowledgably.

"Let's hit the road." Scott stood up, looking to Danny.

"Wait, don't we need a plan?" Danny asked.

"We have one. We go to the hotel, break into the room and see if Stiles is there. If he's not, I'll smell around, see if I can pick up a scent and if I can, we follow that trail and if I can't, we come up with a plan once plan A fails."

"Alright then." Danny stood, deciding to trust Scott. He was a bit shaken by the werewolf thing, but finding Stiles was his top priority right now and he wasn't going to let his shock of what he had been so sure was fantasy and fiction get in the way of helping someone he cared about.

"So…when did you and Stiles get so close?" Scott asked as Danny drove to the hotel.

"When you weren't there for him," Danny replied, not meaning to be hostile, though a part of him wondered that, if Scott had been a better friend, Stiles might be safe right now.

"Harsh." Scott sighed, slipping back down into the chair. "I uh…I know I haven't been the best of friends, but I never thought Derek would go after him, I just assumed he would go for Allison."

"Allison…who is a trained archer and knows how to look after herself, not to mention has parents who are trained wolf hunters to protect her?"

"You're being unfair," Scott stated.

"Am I?" he asked. "Derek knew how close you and Stiles were and, like you, he knew how defenseless Stiles was against him, and yet you chose solely to protect Allison and not even entertain the possibility that there might be someone else he could get to you through." Danny paused, taking a deep breath. "And what's so bad about joining his pack anyways?" Danny asked. "Is it worth Stiles' life?"

"If I join his pack, he'll make me kill with him," Scott said, trying to keep his anger down. A part of him felt that Danny was being unfair to him, but an even larger part knew that the other boy was right, that he hadn't thought to protect Stiles and that it was his fault that they were in this position.

"Can't you lie to him? Say you'll join the pack so that he'll let Stiles go and then just…not?"

"That's not the way it works!" Scott slammed his hand down on the dashboard.

"Then how does it work?"

"If you say you're going to be in someone's pack, you do it, if you lie, they tear you and everyone you love apart. He'd be safe temporarily if I lied, but in the long run it wouldn't matter."

"Oh." Danny bit his lip.

"Now it's time for you to be honest with me." Scott looked sidelong at Danny. "I've told you everything about me, and that wasn't easy, so now it's your turn. I know you're gay, and now I want to know, do you have a thing for Stiles?"

"Honestly?" Danny gripped the wheel, his knuckles going white. "I don't know, and if we don't save him, I won't ever be able to explore what it is that I might be feeling for him, so why don't we just keep our eye on the prize, eh? Do what we can to save his life."

"Fine." Scott turned away, letting Danny drive. The entered the hotel and went to the room. "They were definitely here," Scott stated, backing up and running at the door, breaking it down, not caring if anyone saw. After all, this was his best friend they were trying to save.

"Damnit." Danny sighed as he looked around the empty hotel room. "Nothing, they're not here."

"No, they're not." Scott bit his lip. "They went out the window, probably down the fire escape." He gestured to the open window.

"So…what now?" Danny asked, sitting down on the bed.

"Now we come up with a new plan," he stated. "Because Stiles is hurt."

"What? How do you know that?" Danny stood up again, looking more than concerned.

"Because there's blood on the carpet and it's Stiles'." He sighed, gesturing to a few spots of blood. "Don't worry, it's not much, but you know how Stiles can get, he annoys some people and Derek is absolutely one of those people…and what with the clue he gave us, I can't imagine that Derek would be happy about that."

"Fuck." He sighed, shaking his head, about to say more when Scott's phone rang.

"Hello?" Scott answered, biting his lip.

"Hello, Scott. It's me, Derek."

"Where's Stiles?" Scott asked, gesturing for Danny to be silent.

"He's with me, of course." Scott could practically here Derek's smirk over the phone, and he clenched his fist, trying to keep himself in check. "And he's one brash motherfucker, too. I did not see that one coming. He's standing up to me, protecting you. I wanted him to be making this call because I thought that it would be easier for you if he asked you to do it, but he refused. I tried to put him in his place, but it's not really working."

"What did you do to him?" Scott asked, slamming his fist into the wall, doing everything he could to keep his rage down, to keep from transforming.

"Oh, it's just a couple broken bones, nothing that won't heal if given proper attention. However, if you don't do what I want, I may just have to kill him, set him up, use him as an example for you, as a display of what I will do to everyone in your life that you even remotely care about if you don't join me."

"Don't you see that I can never be loyal to you now?" Scott asked. "You've hurt my friend, threatened everyone else…there's no way that I could ever trust you enough to be loyal."

"I think you'll find a way." Derek laughed over the phone. "You have two days to figure it out, though the sooner the better, because Stiles won't be getting any better with time, in fact, he may be getting worse. If you're not ready to commit in two days time, I'll start sending you pieces of your beloved friend in the mail."

"Two days?" Scott asked.

"Two days." Derek hung up, leaving Scott standing in the middle of the hotel room, shocked.

"Well?" Danny asked softly.

"He's hurting him," Scott stated. "And if I don't commit to his pack in two days, he said he's going to kill Stiles."

"And you think he'll do it?" Danny asked.

"I didn't, not at first, but I'm starting to, yeah." Scott reached up, running a hand through his mussed hair.

"What are we going to do?" Danny asked.

"I'm going to call Allison, you're going to call Jackson, we're going to get them over here, we're going to track Derek to wherever he's keeping Stiles and we are going to stop him from EVER hurting anyone ever again." Scott spoke with such a distinct sense of finality that Danny didn't even bother to contend him. Maybe he hadn't been the friend that Stiles had needed before, but it seemed pretty clear that he was going to do almost anything that he could to save his friend, Danny just hoped that almost anything was going to be enough.

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN I do have to admit that it might not be until at least Sunday that I post again because I shall be traveling home for spring break (yay) but fear not, I shall return!_**

**_Question for the chapter: Should Scott shape up, or continue to be kind of a dippy $#! for the rest of the story?_**


	11. Chapter 11

"What's going on?" Jackson entered the hotel room, arms folded across his chest. It was roughly 7 AM at this point, and he looked exhausted.

"Derek Hale took Stiles," Danny stated without skipping a beat.

"What?" Jackson's eyes widened. "Danny…what are you even doing here?"

"He knows everything," Scott stated, trying to move the debriefing along as fast as possible. The longer they took to stage a rescue, the worse off Stiles would be and Scott didn't want any more harm to come to his friend than absolutely necessary.

"What would Derek want with Stiles?" Jackson asked.

"He wants Scott to join the pack," Allison said, walking in through the door, bow and arrows in their casings, slung over her shoulder.

"And Stiles has to do with that how?"

"He knew that he wouldn't be able to get at Allison, that I would be protecting her as well as her family, so…so he went for Stiles instead." Scott shuddered, hating every time that he had to own up to the fact that what was happening to his best friend was his fault.

"Okay, fill me in." Jackson gulped. He had been a wolf for a little while, but he wasn't terribly good with control and while he had demanded the bite initially, now all that he wanted was to get rid of it. Not only did it not make him happy, but it threatened to make him hurt Lydia and she had been through enough at the hands of a wolf already, she didn't need the worry of him hurting her on top of that.

"We have two days to find and save him or he's going to be killed, but the sooner we get to him, the better. Derek said that he was going to hurt him more the longer Scott waited to join his pack and because, for some reason, that's not going to happen, we have to stage the rescue to save him." Danny looked sidelong at Scott, still not entirely sure why the other boy couldn't just join the pack. There had to be ways around this that would cause Stiles less pain.

"Well I can pick up scents," Jackson stated. "And the blood on the carpet helps."

"Blood on the carpet?" Allison looked up at Scott.

"Yeah." Scott sighed. "Derek was holding him here and Stiles tipped us off, I guess the conclusion we can draw is that he got made and struck him."

"Are you sure it's Stiles' blood?" Allison asked.

"Without a doubt." Scott nodded. He knew the scent difference between Stiles and Derek and he was certain that the injury sustained had been to his friend.

"Okay then." Allison walked over to Scott, putting a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "What's the plan?"

"The plan?" Scott bit his lip. "Jackson and I are going to track the scents and hope that we can find out where they're holed up. Danny is going to GPS track my phone's location with his so that the two of you can follow behind in the car. Once we get there and assess the situation, we'll figure out how to go in and pull him out."

"Okay then." Jackson sighed. He wasn't Stiles' biggest fan, but he knew that Stiles had had a very big hand in saving Lydia's life, and Jackson was willing to do pretty much anything to get back and stay in Lydia's good graces. It had taken some hellish experiences for him to realize how much he really loved her and now he was working on making up for what a jerk he had been to her. "Let's do this."

"Wait." Allison bit her lip. "We need to be more prepared, I think…"

"How could we be more prepared?" Danny asked. "We've got two werewolves, a wolf hunter/archer and, well, I'm kind of useless, but I'll do anything that I can."

"Wait." Jackson frowned. "How did you even get pulled into all of this?"

"I've been spending a lot of time with Stiles." Danny shrugged. "Scott was busy with Allison and you were busy with Lydia, so we kind of bonded over the mutual "our best friends are busy with girls" thing."

"But him?" Jackson asked, wrinkling his nose, clearly feeling as though his best friend could do better than the spastic son of the Beacon Hills Sheriff.

"Yes, him," Danny snapped. "He's actually a really good guy. If you got to know him, then maybe you would see that."

"Look, boys, shut up!" Allison rolled her eyes, not terribly keen on being the voice of reason, but if all these boys were going to do was argue, well, someone had to step in and it might as well be her. "You can argue about friendship later, okay? If what Scott said is true, every minute that we delay, we're causing Stiles more pain and do we want to do that?"

"No," all three boys said in unison.

"Exactly." Allison put one hand on her hip. "Now get your assess into gear. Danny, you set up the tracker with Scott's phone, Jackson, you stop being a little bitch about Stiles. He's a good guy and even if he weren't, it wouldn't matter because he doesn't deserve whatever it is Derek is doing to him.

Scott smiled slightly, enjoying Allison taking initiative, but quickly sat down on the bed, helping Danny with the phone tracking while Jackson and Allison talked about ways to help control his rage and emotions. He still wasn't 100 percent when it came to shifting and they would need him to be in good control if this was going to work out.

In all, the prep time took them about an hour, most of that spent trying to get the phone GPS to sync up without having to go get any external equipment. With his skills, Danny was able to do so, of course, but it wasn't easy and it took some time.

"Alright, got it." Danny stood up, holding tight to his phone, knowing that the combination of his phone and Scott's would be what ultimately led them to where they were going. Danny was nervous, his heart racing. He had no idea how to fight anyone, but he knew that he had to trust his friend. He didn't want to get left behind, not when Stiles' life was on the line and if there was any change that he would be of any use at all, he wanted to make sure that he was there for the other boy. Maybe he wasn't a wolf or a hunter, but neither was Stiles, and it might help for him to have someone else around who wasn't all powerful.

"Okay, well why don't you two get moving," Allison said to Scott and Jackson, picking up her boy and arrows. "Danny come with me. We'll take my car, you can navigate, I'll drive."

"Alright." Danny nodded, sure that Allison was a much better driver than him, and besides, he wasn't sure that he had the composure to drive right now. He followed her to the parking lot, leaving the other two boys to do their thing.

"So, you and Stiles?" Allison asked as she started the car engine.

"What?" Danny looked at her, caught off guard.

" I mean, correct me if I'm wrong but you're about to potentially risk your life to save him and you two weren't close until just recently. Am I reading into this wrong?"

"I honestly don't know." Danny sighed. "I'm going to tell you what I told Scott, which is that our friendship is young and yes, I do find him attractive and fun to be around, but I haven't spent enough time with him yet to know if there's really…something there. He's a great guy and he's been neglected by too many people in his life. I think it's important that he know we care about him and I'm coming with because, well, I want him to know that I wasn't all talk this past week."

"That's really noble, Danny." Allison smiled. "Now you might want to hold on, I don't plan on cooperating with speed limits."

"Yes, ma'am." Danny nodded, grabbing the "oh shit handle" with one hand, looking at the GPS on his phone with the other, staring intently at the blue dot that was Scott and Jackson. "Start off going right."

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN And they're off! Let me know what you think!_**

**_Question: What is your favorite non-Teen Wolf show on Television._**


	12. Chapter 12

"Sit up." Derek's words were nothing short of commanding as he entered the room. Stiles struggled weakly to do so, but failed to the point where Derek walked over and pulled him up into a sitting position. "Drink this." He held up a plastic, store bought water bottle.

"I'm not drinking anything that you give me," Stiles stated, his tone of voice and choice of words much braver than he actually felt.

"It's still sealed from the store, and besides, I'm not going to poison you." Derek laughed. "If and when I decide to kill you, I'll do it with my bare hands…and maybe my teeth."

"Good to know," Stiles said sarcastically.

"Now drink."

Derek forced the bottle to Stiles' lips and the boy took a sip. He swished the water around in his mouth for a few seconds before spitting it out, hitting Derek right in the face. The action was not met with words, but with Derek rising to his feet, towering over his injured captive.

Before Stiles even had a chance to dodge, Derek aimed a swift, forceful kick to his torso, followed by a sickening crack that left both Derek and Stiles with no doubt in their minds that, at least one rib had broken. Stiles howled in pain, his body crumbling to the floor, curled into as fetal of a position as he could manage. Tears stung at his eyes, but he was determined not to let Derek see him cry; he wasn't ready to give that much away, he wasn't ready to concede to the wolf in this battle of physical strength versus will.

"I'm breaking you," Derek stated, stationing himself over Stiles, looking down at his wounded victim.

"You're – you're breaking my body," Stiles gasped, having difficulty breathing, let alone talking. "Not my spirit."

"You aren't invincible, Stiles," Derek informed him, hiding the frustration he felt with Stiles' refusal to submit to him. "Yes, I am breaking your body, but what you don't seem to understand is that, eventually, that will change. After all, I can kill you, Stiles, and what good is spirit and heart if you're dead?" Derek placed his hands on his hips, hoping that his intimidation was starting to wear on the boy's determination.

Stiles said nothing. Deep down, it was clear that Derek was right, if he was dead physically, his spirit no longer mattered, but he wasn't dead yet and with every movement, he remained alive he intended to fight Derek mentally. He knew that he must look weak, curled into a little ball, wrists tied behind his back, pain radiating from every last part of his body. Physically, he was weak, but mentally, he had never felt stronger. He wasn't going to go out with a fizzle and even if no one but Derek ever knew that, it would be enough for him.

"What, cat got your tongue?" Derek asked, leaning down so that his face was right next to the other boy's ears. "Or do you just know that I'm right and you don't want to admit it because it will make you look weak?"

Stiles squeezed his eyes shut, afraid that if Derek looked in his eyes, he would know just how bad the other boy felt. He was afraid, yes, but he was strong and he had to keep telling himself that he would get through this, or that, if he didn't, he wouldn't go down weak and begging for mercy. That wasn't who he had been before this ordeal and it wasn't who he was now.

"Well let me tell you something, Stiles." Derek leaned even closer, his breath hot on Stiles' neck as he spoke. "You _are_ weak. If you could see yourself now, you'd know that. If you could see yourself, curled up, beaten, broken, you'd know just how weak you truly are. You can lie to yourself, tell yourself that you're strong but you're not. You're nothing, Stiles, but a lowly human. Think about it. You can't make the lacrosse team, at least not first line, you can't get a girl to go on a date with you, at least not of her own free will, your father works almost all the time just to avoid being at home with you and your best friend won't even do one measly, painless thing to save your life."

He had been in pain before. Throughout his 16 years, Stiles had known many kinds of pain that most people never had to deal with. His mother had died, leaving him alone with a father who barely knew what to do with him, a father who worked too much to avoid the hurt that being at home alone with his son caused. He had experienced the fear of being held captive by someone whom he was sure was going to kill him and the relief when he had been released. He had felt the pain of his best friend trying to kill him because he was taken over by something uncontrollable, but nothing hurt as much as this. The physical pain that Derek was causing and even worse, the pain that came with knowing that Derek might just be right.

"There's a lot more at stake with him joining your pack than you're making it seem," Stiles hissed, his pain increasing with every word.

"Is that what he told you, Stiles?" Derek asked. "Did he tell you that it would hurt him to join my pack? No harm would come to him, no harm would come to the ones that he loved, no harm would have to come to _anyone_. I would want loyalty from him, nothing else…though I guess Scott has a problem with loyalty, given that you're lying here and he's…where is he, Stiles?" Derek grabbed the boy, forcing Stiles to make eye contact with him. "Is he with Allison? Is he with his lacrosse friends? Is he at a party?"

Again, Stiles said nothing. He had seen enough movies, enough TV shows and read enough books to know what this was. Derek was trying to psych him out, to make him feel as though his family and friends didn't care about him, but he wasn't going to let that happen. If he died here, he was going to die knowing that he was loved, even if his captor was going to do everything that he could to stop that.

"You really aren't feeling terribly chatty today, are you?" Derek let out a short laugh, sending chill up Stiles' spine. "Is it because you're so hurt that you can't bear to speak? Is the pain too much, Stiles?"

"NO!" Stiles managed to shout, looking at Derek indignantly. "It's because you're trying to ruin everything that I have left in my life and I don't understand why because I've done nothing but try to help you and Scott over the past few months."

"Wow." Derek leaned back, sitting down and staring at Stiles. "I didn't expect that from you."

"What?" Stiles asked, anger boiling inside of him. Everyone thought that he was so weak, no one ever thought that this kid, this kid who hid so much pain and suffering under the guise of being a goofy, class clown, might actually be able to stand up for himself.

"I didn't expect you to be asking for more pain." He showed Stiles his claws, reaching for the boy and ripping through the boy's shirt, cutting deep lines down his chest. Again, Stiles felt the pain, wincing, breaking as heavily as his crushed ribs would let him. "It won't be much longer before you can take it."

"I can take anything you have to dish out," Stiles stated, gulping. He knew that Derek could hear his heartbeat, that he would know that Stiles was starting to wonder if he had a physical breaking point. He was going to try his best to be strong, but he couldn't think of what else Derek could do to him physically, of what he else he could live through.

"Can you?" he asked, tilting his head to the side, clawing his way back up the boy's chest, drawing blood every step of the way. "You're all alone in this world, Stiles. No on loves you, no one cares about you and absolutely no one is coming to save you. It won't be long before you're dead, and no one is going to care."

Derek stood up, and Stiles slumped back to the ground. As the werewolf left, locking the door behind him, Stiles allowed himself to finally shed a few tears. His entire body seared with more pain than he had ever thought physically possible, and hated the prospect that Derek might be right, that Scott didn't care about him enough, that his father didn't care about him enough, but there was one person in his life that Derek didn't know about. One person who cared about him that Derek wasn't conscious enough of to take away. Danny.

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN I hope you enjoy this! I had fun writing this chapter. :) I'm also sick, so we'll see how fast updating goes. :(_**

**_Question for the chapter: What is your current favorite song?_**


	13. Chapter 13

"This is it," Allison stated, pulling up in front of a perfectly normal looking house. Scott and Jackson ran to meet them and Danny and Allison got out of the car.

"This is where the trail ends," Scott stated. "He's either here or this is where Derek started cleaning up his act."

"Let's hope for the former." Danny looked down, worried about Stiles' well being. He had been the prisoner of a crazy, psychopathic werewolf for too long already and with the blood they had found in the hotel room and the violent threats from Derek, Danny was certain that, physically, Stiles wasn't going to be in good shape.

"What's the plan?" Jackson asked, looking to Scott.

"The same thing it's always been," Scott stated, taking a deep breath and hoping for the best. He wasn't the best of plan makers, but he was ready to do anything that he had to in order to save his friend…at least almost anything.

"Which is…" Danny wasn't sure if Scott and Jackson had discussed this while they were waiting for Danny and Allison, but he didn't know the plan, and neither did the girl standing next to him. He wanted to move, to act quickly so that they could get in there and get Stiles back, but he also knew that he couldn't be hasty because acting swiftly would only help if they were acting within the realm of a decent plan at the same time.

"We're going to go in," Scott said quietly. "Jackson and I are going to shift, Allison is going to take her bow and you are going to get Stiles and get him out to the car."

"What?" Danny frowned. "No, I want to help you fight, I want to take down the bastard that's doing this to you, to Stiles."

"Look, Danny, you're gung ho and you care and that's really, really important, but you don't have a skill that would do anything but get you injured. Derek is powerful, very powerful and I know this because I've fought him before."

"I'm strong!" Danny argued.

"Look," Scott put his hands on Danny's shoulders. "I know that you're upset and that you care about Stiles, and I'm not sure when all of that started, but I know what you told me. You want a chance to get to know him, to see if something is there between you two and the best way for that to help him is for you to go in and carry him out of there. He needs someone to get him out of there as soon as possible and there is no reason why that shouldn't be you. He needs you, Danny." Scott took a deep breath. "As much as I hate to admit it, you're the only person that's been there for him recently, don't stop that now."

"Okay." Danny took a deep breath. Scott was right. If Stiles was hurt, if he couldn't get out of there on his own then someone would have to help him and Danny didn't mind being that person, not once Scott pointed out how important it could be.

"Alright, does everyone understand?" Scott looked at the gang he had assembled. It would be four of them versus one, but that one was more powerful than any individual that had ever gone up against, save for the last alpha, and it would take everything that they had. "We're going in and we're going in hot. If any of you don't want to do this, if you don't want to risk yourselves for this, speak now."

"Scott, shut up." Allison looked at him. "You're being overdramatic. We'll be able to do this, we have to."

"I know." Scott nodded, reaching for Allison's hand and giving it a squeeze before looking to Jackson. He was the link in this team that was most likely to back down. "Jackson?"

"I'm with you," he stated, looking at Scott with a very genuine and serious look in his eyes. He didn't know exactly what he was getting himself into, but he wasn't going to back out like a wuss.

"Alright." Scott let go of Allison's hand, willing himself to shift forms, something that he had gotten increasingly good at in the past few months. He was nervous, afraid that he wouldn't be able to help Stiles, that Derek had lied and that they were too late, or that they weren't here at all, that the trail was cold, but he knew that he had to believe. He had to believe that his friend was in the house and that he was still alive because if anything fatally bad happened to Stiles, Scott would have to live with the fact that it was his fault for the rest of his life.

With high hopes and deep breaths, the team entered, kicking the door down and almost immediately getting the attention of Derek, who walked into the entryway, practically meeting them there.

"I can genuinely say that this is a surprise." He smirked, looking at the two werewolves and two humans. "I didn't think anyone was coming for him, didn't think anyone cared."

"You're wrong," Scott said simply, jumping at Derek instantly, calling for Danny to go find Stiles. With that, the fight was on. Jackson and Scott fought hand to hand and Allison readied her bow while Danny ran off, looking for Stiles.

A combination of instinct and television told him to try the basement, and when he found the door locked, he was certain that he was right. He pulled a Swiss army knife out of his pocket, closing his eyes for a second, taking a deep breath before opening them again and picking the lock. If Stiles were dead, the door wouldn't be locked, but Danny still knew that he should brace himself for whatever he found inside. He heard the lock click and he swung the door open. Stiles was lying on the floor, not moving, and it didn't look good.

"Stiles!" Danny ran to the boy, falling to his knees beside him, instantly using the knife to cut his wrists free.

"D-Danny?" Stiles opened his eyes, sure that he was dreaming. "What are you doing here?"

"Rescuing you," Danny said softly, taking in the site that was Stiles' mangled body. There were cuts and blood everywhere and Stiles didn't look well at all. "Scott, Jackson and Allison are upstairs taking care of Derek, I'm supposed to get you out of here, so what do you say?" He looked down at the boy. "Shall we get you out of here?"

"Yes, please…" Stiles bit his lip. With his broken leg and myriad of other injuries, he was in no place to walk. "I um…I can't."

"I know." Danny stood up and took off his jacket, wrapping it around Stiles' shaking body before lifting him as carefully as possible. "It's going to be okay, Stiles," Danny whispered, sickened by the bloody appearance in front of him. It wasn't that he was repulsed by the sight of the boy, but more that he was disgusted that anyone could do something so horrible to someone like Stiles. He couldn't imagine anyone who was less deserving of that sort of treatment."

"I didn't give up," Stiles choked out as Danny carried him up the stairs. He could hear the crashing and thudding of the fight that was going on between the others and decided to look for a back or side door. He didn't want to expose Stiles to any more pain than he already had to.

"You didn't what?" Danny asked once they were outside.

Stiles was having trouble answering, his crushed ribs making each and every breath incredibly difficult, naturally making each word even worse. Danny decided to wait, to not push it. He didn't know the extent of Stiles' injuries, but he didn't want to force anything out of Stiles for the moment.

He walked to the car, and, supporting Stiles with one arm, opened the door to the backseat. Danny eased the boy in, letting him lie down, and sat beside him, guiding Stiles' head to rest in his lap.

"It's okay," Danny whispered, rubbing the boy's back gently. "You're safe now, it's safe now."

"I didn't give up," Stiles said again. "He told me I would break, that he would break me, but he didn't. I didn't give up."

"Wow." Danny continued to rub gentle circles on Stiles' back while they waited for the rest of the crew. "That's…that's amazing, you're amazing." He looked down at the boy, but Stiles was asleep and Danny wasn't sure if he had heard even a single word that had been uttered.

Danny waited with baited breath for Scott, Jackson and Allison, hoping that all of them would return. It was almost half an hour before they did, and while they looked worse for the wear, they were all alive. Allison got into the driver's seat, Jackson in the back, squeezing in with Stiles and Danny, trying not to crowd them, with Scott in the passenger's seat.

"What happened?" Danny asked.

"Derek's dead, Jackson's not a werewolf anymore," Scott answered shortly.

"What?" Danny's eyes widened. No one answered him, but no one moved. "Look, okay, never mind, but we have to get Stiles to the hospital. He's badly hurt."

"Right." Allison started driving, no one saying anything except for Danny, who whispered quiet words of reassurance to Stiles, unconscious or not.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN don't worry, I will reveal what happened during the fight in later chapters!**_

_**Question: What is your favorite odd food combination? (Who knows? Maybe I'll use it as a favorite of Stiles later one)**_


	14. Chapter 14

When Stiles woke up, he was surrounded by a steady beeping sound and a lot of sights that were unfamiliar to him, at least at first. A couple of more seconds led him to the realization that he was in a hospital room, and a huge wave of relief washed over him. He was safe.

"Hey, Stiles?" his father leaned over the bed, looking at his son practically the instant his eyes opened.

"Dad?"

"Oh my god, come here." His father pulled him into a gentle hug, being careful not to hurt him, though even Stiles in his slightly bleary state could tell that there was a lot of emotion coming from the older man. "I thought I'd lost you."

"I'm right here." Stiles gulped, trying not to cry. He had spent so much time down there thinking about his dad, about how alone he would be if Stiles died. They had had some rough patches, but Stiles loved his dad and he knew that the man loved him too. "I'm not going to leave you, it's just us, we Stilinski men, we gotta stick together."

"I'm just so glad that you're alright." Finally, he pulled away, looking down at his son. "When Scott told me you'd called and asked him to pick you up, I didn't know what was going on. He said that you were badly hurt and in the hospital, I just…do you remember at all what happened?"

"I'm sorry." Stiles shook his head. He remembered every last second of it, but it was going to be easier to let Scott paint the story that he wanted to tell if Stiles didn't get in there and muddle it up. "I don't."

"Scott says from the best he can tell you were being held somewhere and managed to escape. He said you called him and sounded really scared and that he came and got you right away, and thank god he did…though I wish he had called be sooner than he did."

"Dad." Stiles looked up at his father from where he lay on the bed. "Can you be a dad right now and not…not a sheriff?"

"Okay." The Sheriff smiled at his son and took a seat right next to the bed. "I'm sorry, it's just…you're the only person I've got left and knowing that something happened to you, that you could have been killed, really worries me."

"I'll be fine," Stiles said softly. "Whatever pain meds they're giving me are wonderful." He smiled, always the joker. He knew that he must be on something, because while he was full of dull aches, nothing was too awful, and he was hooked up to about 3 machines and an IV.

"Very funny." His dad rolled his eyes, though he smiled at his son. Stiles was always trying to lighten the mood and he was impressed that, even in the hospital with some very serious injuries, he was still trying to make jokes.

"So, what's the damage?" Stiles asked, looking down at his body, bandages all over him.

"You've got two shattered bones in your leg, three broken ribs, a concussion and a lot of cuts and bruises, namely really deep scratches on your chest."

"Oh." Stiles gulped, trying to hide that he remembered exactly how and when each of those wounds had come to be.

"I'm sorry you had to go through this," his father said softly. "But I've already got the best physical therapist in town on the line and she's ready to see you when you're out of the hospital, and the doctor's said that-"

"Dad." Stiles grabbed his father's arm, shaking his head. "Not right now, just be here for me, okay?" The teen felt tears welling in his eyes. He had been so scared, but so brave and now that he was safe and lying to his father, all that he wanted to do was curl up into a little ball and cry, but he had to stay strong for his dad because he knew that, after losing his mom, his dad wasn't as strong as he pretended to be.

"Of course, I'm sorry. I'm trying."

"I know." Stiles nodded. "I know, dad, and trying is good enough, okay?"

Stiles squeezed his eyes shut for a few seconds, trying to blink back tears, but when he opened them again, he was surprised to see a shape in the corner of the room. He turned his head and saw Danny, curled up in a chair, sleeping.

"Dad?" Stiles pointed. "What's he doing here?"

"Danny hasn't left your side since they brought you in. He told them he was your cousin or something to get staying rights."

"How long have I been out?" Stiles asked.

"About 15 hours," his father admitted. "Scott and Allison were here for awhile, but they got kicked out when visiting hours ended. Danny and I have been taking turns sleeping so that you wouldn't have to be alone when you woke up."

"Oh." Stiles could hardly believe it. Danny had been sleeping in an uncomfortable plastic chair…for him? It didn't make sense. His father he understood. His dad was too worried about losing the only family he had left to abandon Stiles in the hospital but Danny could have opted to go home with the rest of his friends, go sleep in a real bed and instead he was here.

"He's a good friend." His father smiled. "You don't have a lot of friends, but the ones that you do have, they're keepers, son. I mean Danny, willing to stay here all night just to make sure that you don't have to wake up alone, and Scott driving out into the middle of god knows where at god knows what time to pick you up? You made good choices."

"I know." Stiles gulped, still trying to fight back tears.

It was fighting with Scott in the first place that had gotten him into this situation, it was Scott's carelessness about who Derek might go after that had brought this all on, but that didn't matter anymore. Instead of letting Stiles die at the hands of his enemy, Scott had fought for him, and now he was alive, safe, and Derek was dead. He didn't know the details yet, but he was sure that, as soon as his father was gone, someone would tell him what was going on.

"You should wake him up, tell him that he can go home," Stiles said softly. He wanted Danny to be comfortable, and nothing was going to happen to Stiles in the hospital. He didn't need to be watched over by his friends 24/7.

"I tried." He shrugged. "It really didn't sound like he was going anywhere, but I'll give it another shot, see if now that you're up and clearly alive, he'll be able to let himself go home and get some real sleep."

"Thanks." Stiles pushed a button on the bed, helping it rise so that he was sitting up more than laying down.

"Hey." Sheriff Stilinski shook Danny.

"What, is something happening?" Danny asked, waking up instantly.

"He woke up." The sheriff smiled. "He's asking you to go home and get some real sleep."

"Not gonna happen." Danny shot out of the chair and was by the bedside in seconds. "Hey, are you alright?" He looked at Stiles, biting his lip. He didn't want to give too much away in one glance, but Stiles was too drugged up to read anything into anyways.

"I'm fine." Stiles smiled. "Well, you know, not fine, but I will be." He wanted Danny to explain to him what had happened, he wanted to know what was going on, but he knew that none of this could be explained with his father in the room. "Hey, dad?"

"Yes, son?"

"Do you think…do you think maybe you could go get me some ice cream? I'd go get it myself, but…" he gestured to the cast on his leg and the bandages all over him.

"Of course, Danny, do you want some?"

"No thanks." Danny shook his head, taking the seat that the sheriff had been occupying next to the bed. Stiles waited for his dad to leave, shutting the door to the private room before he turned to Danny, ready to get the full low down.

"So, what happened?"

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN AAAAND we're back. Sorry that took so long, I got sick!**_

_**Question: What song do you think best encompasses your personality?**_


	15. Chapter 15

Stiles listened patiently as Danny explained what had happened between everyone. After Danny had pulled Stiles out of the personal hell, Scott and Jackson went directly for Derek while Allison stood back, shooting from a distance. Her arrows weakened him, but it was Jackson who delivered the final blow. He had known that, if he killed Derek, he could be free of the curse and while he had thought it was something that he wanted, he had been slowly realizing that it was far from everything that he had expected, that the benefits were not worth the downsides.

"So you…you know everything, then?" Stiles asked, looking up innocently at Danny. Not even for a moment of his captivity had he envisioned this as the outcome, Jackson killing Derek Hale to free himself from the curse and Danny knowing, well, everything.

"I know most things, yeah." Danny gingerly reached out, taking Stiles' hand. "I know that he really, really hurt you, Stiles, and I'm sorry that it took me – us, as long as it did to come for you."

"Hey, don't worry about it." Stiles bit his lip, ignoring the hand holding his; they were in a hospital, after all and it was common practice. "I'm actually, well, a little surprised that you came at all. Most people wouldn't be willing to go head to head with a werewolf unarmed."

"Yeah…and normally I probably wouldn't have either, but my friend was in danger and think about it, Stiles – would you do the same for me?"

"Well…yes, but I have experience with Derek and with werewolves and whatnot, so it's different. I would at least have known what I was getting into. You were going in pretty much blind. I'm not sure that I would have been able to do that, to do anything if, you know, I didn't have practice."

"I mean, it's not like I fought the guy. I just pulled you out and waited in the car. Scott, Jackson and Allison did all of the real work."

"Danny, stop." Stiles looked the taller boy directly in the eye. "Don't make this less than it is, okay? You saved my life. You dragged me away from someone who was definitely going to kill me. In my book, that's pretty damned important."

"I-" Danny opened his mouth to argue, but Stiles shook his head, giving him a look that told Danny how pointless it would be to argue.

"Thank you," Stiles said softly, still looking Danny directly in the eye so that he would know just how genuine the "thank you" really was. Stiles knew that, without the four people that come to his rescue earlier, he would be dead right now, and he was mighty glad that this wasn't the case; glad that he was alive and safe.

"You're welcome." Danny shrugged it off. In all honesty, he was still worried about Stiles. From what he had seen, Derek had really gone out of his way to mess Stiles up, and he couldn't help but wonder if Stiles was hiding some of the pain he was feeling, both physical and emotional. The pain medication might be masking some things, but Danny felt as though Stiles seemed far more…okay than he should be after such a painful ordeal.

"Danny, you should go home," Stiles stated, not wanting his friend to feel as though he had to stay. He hadn't known Danny for too long, and he still didn't know him well. "You need to get some sleep, some real sleep. I'd imagine it hasn't been an easy couple days."

"Hey, it's fine, I'm fine," Danny stated, not wanting to leave Stiles behind. This was his friend, and more than that, this was someone that Danny felt was starting to care about in another way. If things weren't as fine as they seemed, he didn't want Stiles to have to be alone.

"Look, just because I have it worse at the moment than you do doesn't mean that you didn't go through something as well. What you did…it was brave and a little bit stupid. You need to go home, rest, Danny. You've done more than enough for me, now go home, do something for yourself, okay?" Stiles tilted his head to the side, offering Danny an encouraging smile, hoping that it would convince the other boy that he was alright.

"Are you sure?" Danny asked, biting down gently on his lip. "I mean, I don't want to leave you here alone, not after everything that you've been through – I mean, what if you need something?"

"My dad will be back soon, Danny, and until them, I have the nurse call button and enough morphine or Demerol or whatever this is, to keep the pain at bay. I'll be fine, Danny, now stop taking care of me and go look after yourself, okay?"

"I…uh…" Danny didn't want to leave Stiles on his own, but he had no words to combat Stiles' insistence, at least nothing that wouldn't alienate the injured boy. "Are you sure that you'll be okay alone?"

"Yes! I'm positive!" Stiles nodded. A lot had happened, and while he didn't know if he would feel safe if left alone, he didn't want to put Danny in a position, where he felt forced to stay. He had already done so much for Stiles – being there during the rescue, then staying, waiting for him to wake up. Stiles wanted his friend to be able to relax, at least a little bit.

"Fine." Danny stood up. "But I'll come back, okay? Once I'm good and rested." Danny knew that it might be weird, his insistence to check up on the other boy, but he wanted to be there for Stiles as much as he could be. After everything, Stiles deserved someone who cared so much.

"Okay." Stiles smiled, glad that Danny was willing to watch his back, but at the same time, he just wanted the other boy to go and look after himself.

"I'll see you soon," Danny promised as he ducked out the door, leaving Stiles by himself.

Stiles fell back against the bed, looking up at the ceiling. He was afraid to close his eyes because he was afraid of the nightmares that he knew would come if he did. What had he been through had been hell for him, and he wasn't sure how to deal with that. He couldn't tell his father, because it sounded too crazy, and absolutely no therapist would believe him. He had Scott, he supposed, but Scott wasn't always the best at listening and Danny? Well, Danny had already done enough. Stiles sighed, shaking his head. He didn't want to be alone, not again, not anymore, but he didn't know who to turn to right now. He didn't understand just how much Danny cared, just how much the other boy wanted to hear Stiles' thoughts and insecurities, how much Danny wanted to help him.

Stiles curled up, waiting for his dad to get back, secretly hoping that it was soon. He knew that Derek was gone, that the main danger from his life was no longer a threat, but a more irrational part of him was scared, and that part wanted to be protected. He wished that Danny had stayed, but he knew how important it was for him to get rest, and he wasn't getting good rest in the crappy, plastic hospital chair. Stiles took a deep breath, trying to let the drugs help him relax. He was fine, he was safe and Derek was dead. There was nothing to be afraid of…except for maybe how much he wanted Danny to stay by his side.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN Sorry that this took so long...wish I could say that it was worth the wait. I also apologize for the fact that it's short...I've been sick/working on my thesis, but yeah...Stiles/Danny moments...YAY!**_

**_Question: Do you even read the questions/should I nix them?_**


End file.
